Target Age Range: Birth - 18 months
Runtime: Approx. 27 minutes
Popsies - DVD Overview
Created specifically for infants ages birth – 18 months, Popsies employs hand puppets, color, and music to entertain infants and reinforce simple behavioral concepts. The DVD capitalizes on babies’ love of primary colors with bright cloth hand puppets which perform a series of skits in the following themes: Strength, Giving, Love & Family, Building, Hide & Seek, Mothering, Grooming, Happy & Sad, Music, Sharing, and Dancing.
Popsies is set to original music performed by creator Steve Weinrebe on the Appalachian dulcimer. While the puppets do not use words, simple concepts and feelings are conveyed through music and the puppets’ expressive actions. Regarding the curriculum and development of the video, Steve Weinrebe relates:
“Primary colors, linear episodes without quick cut-aways, rhythmic music, bright patterned backgrounds, and stories that introduce simple behavioral concepts, all employ early childhood theory on infants and media, and what is most nurturing and accessible for that age range."
Popsies - Guide Review
Popsies' simple visual structure and stories are age-appropriate and interesting to babies, but the DVDs greatest asset is its soundtrack. The rhythmic music performed on the Appalachian dulcimer provides infants with an experience that is quite different and very engaging.
While there is some controversy regarding babies and watching television, Popsies attempts to address the issues through pacing and careful, purposeful content. Because of the gentle pace and the simplicity of the characters, Popsies may not hold some babies' attention as well as the more well-known infant videos; however, the structure and pace used in the video hold truer to the real-life experiences through which infants actually thrive and learn.
